Offshore Outsourcing Teacher Inservice Education: The Long-Term Effects of a Four-Month Pedagogical Program on Japanese Teachers of English

Abstract

This longitudinal study tracked five public junior and senior high school Japanese teachers of English (JTEs) who were sponsored by the Japanese Ministry of Education, Culture, Sports, Science and Technology (MEXT) to study English and Communicative Language Teaching (CLT) pedagogy at a host university in Canada. This qualitative case study found that teachers who were not bound by practical constraints such as grammar-based entrance examinations or external influences such as a perceived need to conform to the practices of colleagues were able to incorporate what they had learned in Canada. However, high school teachers facing these constraints tended to abandon new practices in favor of traditional teaching methods such as grammar translation. These findings suggest that JTEs do benefit from overseas study, but that the extent of what they can incorporate into their regular teaching practice depends on the context in which they teach. The findings imply that host program planners and instructors could benefit from a closer look at constraints faced by third-year public high school teachers in particular, as it is they who face the greater number of obstacles to incorporating CLT into their regular teaching practice.